


Many Happy Returns

by Mangaluva



Category: Pocket Monsters: X & Y | Pokemon X & Y Versions
Genre: Feelings, Gen, Or the fact that Bri's gonna be a time traveler one day, Probably completely impenetrable without knowing either of our fics, Spoilers, birthday fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-07
Updated: 2018-08-07
Packaged: 2019-06-23 09:25:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,262
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15603306
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mangaluva/pseuds/Mangaluva
Summary: Happy 27th, Bri <3





	Many Happy Returns

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Isis_the_Sphinx](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Isis_the_Sphinx/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Eyes of the Beholder](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1804825) by [Isis_the_Sphinx](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Isis_the_Sphinx/pseuds/Isis_the_Sphinx). 



It took a while for Brienne to notice the old lady sitting in a far corner of the cafe. Grace hadn’t quite booked out the whole cafe, so there were a few patrons who weren’t there for Brienne’s birthday party, but there were enough people taking up enough tables that it wasn’t until Tierno and Trevor had had to run for their train, starting the steady trickle of people starting to leave, that she caught sight on the woman in the back corner, eating a slice of blukberry pie and nodding her head slightly as she listened to music. Her hair was in a short pixie cut and she was wearing earrings made out of guitar picks, but what really made Brienne’s heart stutter momentarily was how  _ exactly  _ the woman looked like her grandma.

 

_ You’re just projecting, _ she reminded herself, brushing the woman out of her mind as she gave Saylee and Blue a fist-bump goodbye before Blue’s Alakazam teleported them back to the embassy, where they were officially supposed to be. She threw herself into a jam session with Ariadne, flirted with Shauna a little and then her brother too just because it was her  _ birthday _ , dammit, and let Maria fuss over her. But every so often, more and more, she found her eyes drifting to the little old lady.

 

“Ahh, I am afraid that I am far past my old man bedtime,” Looker declared, standing up and pulling his coat on. “This has been a delightful day, Brienne.  _ Bonne anniversaire _ !”

 

“Thanks, Looker,” Brienne said, hugging him goodbye. “You sure you don’t need somebody to hold your hand on the way home in case you fall over?”

 

“Pssh! I do not pay so much for robot legs that fall over,” Looker scoffed, hugging her back tightly. “Might I add,” he whispered as he hugged her, “that there is an old lady in the corner with a very… familiar aura?”

 

Brienne stiffened. “I thought I was imagining it,” she whispered. “Are you saying she’s really…?”

 

“I think,” Looker said, leaning back and holding her at arms’ length with a smile, “you ought to go say hello. She has been here all this time, after all.  _ Sayonara _ !”

 

“Goodnight, Papa!” Emma called, waving as he let himself out of the cafe. “Hey, guys, a friend of mine just messaged me--he’s working an opera rock concert tonight he can get us into if we want!”

 

“Oh,  _ nice _ ,” Bri said with a grin. “You had me at ‘opera rock’.”

 

“We’re definitely in this cafe  _ way _ too late,” Shauna noted, looking at the twilit streets outside. “Okay, bill time. Obviously Bri isn’t paying…”

 

While the others started hashing out the bill, Brienne slipped away, muttering something about the bathroom, but instead slipped into the booth across from the old lady, who was on what must have been her sixth slice of pie. The woman took her headphones out of her ears and smirked as Bri looked her up and down. “Took you long enough,” she commented, scooping up some stray pie crumbs with her fork. “Not that I’m complaining. You’re right. You are  _ never _ going to have blukberry pie this good in your  _ life _ .”

 

“Okay, so… I’m gonna take Looker up on the… time-travelling goddess thing he’s selling?” Bri theorized.

 

“Oooh,  _ goddess _ , I  _ forgot _ I used to call myself that,” the old lady said in delight. “Whyever did I  _ stop _ ?”

 

“And I look just like Grandma,” Bri said, which made the older lady’s smile soften. “And I look… surprisingly good in a pixie cut.”

 

“I do, don’t I?” the old lady said happily. “Well, truth be told, my back’s starting to go, reaching up to comb my hair was getting to be a nightmare, so I thought, why bother? My time with Dialga’s running out. This will probably be my last time-jump before I pass things on to… you know, I’m reasonably sure he’s Looker’s reincarnation. So I know he’s getting old, but when his time comes, you don’t need to worry that you won’t see him again. He’s a little different, but still so very  _ him _ . It’s also funny as  _ hell _ to get to mentor  _ him _ .”

 

“Is… that what you’re here to tell me?” Bri said, already reeling after less than sixty seconds of conversation with her own future self.  _ Is this how  _ everybody _ feels having a conversation with me? _

 

“No, Bri,” the old lady said, folding her hands on the table. “I’m here because you have a question to ask me. And you don’t have to be afraid of the answer, I promise you that.”

 

“Will it screw up time if I don’t ask the first question that came to mind?” Bri asked curiously.

 

“It doesn’t really matter, because you’re going to ask it,” the older lady said simply. “You’re not going to pass this chance up. You  _ can’t _ . I sure couldn’t.”

 

And dammit, she  _ couldn’t _ .

 

“Did I make the right choice?” she asked, willing her voice not to crack. “Staying here? Was it the right decision?”

 

The old lady leaned across the table, putting her soft, wrinkled hands on Bri’s and squeezing gently but with surprising strength. “ _ Yes _ ,” she said emphatically, looking Bri directly in the eyes. “Yes, yes, a thousand times  _ yes _ . You’ll get times to look back on that world, even visit, and you’ll wonder about the life you might have led there, but in a lifetime of wondering, I have never once managed to conceive of a life I could have had there that’s half so fulfilling as the one I have here. I can’t imagine a love that could match the love I’ve had here, and back home  _ certainly _ isn’t half so accepting of the kind of love we enjoy, believe me. So please, take it from me: you can drop most of the regrets and  _ all _ of the fear. You made the right choice, Bri. You  _ did _ .”

 

Brienne snatched a tissue to wipe her eyes with. The wave of  _ relief  _ was almost unfathomable, like a hand she’d just gotten used to had suddenly released its grip on her throat. “Should I be taking notes to tell all this to myself one day?” she joked weakly. 

 

“No need, Bri,” the old lady promise with a smile. “I did this because I remembered how much I needed it, and I’m speaking off the cuff, but I know what I need to hear. Speak from your heart, Bri, and you’ll always find the right words.”

 

“Damn, those should be song lyrics,” Bri whistled.

 

“Oh, they will be,” the old lady said with a wink, flicking one of her guitar-pick earrings. “Now, you go enjoy that concert with your friends, because it is an  _ amazing _ show, and keep an eye on the second warmup band, they’re going to be  _ big _ this time in a couple of years. Buy some merch, get it signed, they’ll be delighted. And look  _ forward _ to life! It’ll have its ups and downs but it’s going to be a good one, I promise you. And I, meanwhile, am going to finish this and get a last slice to go, because this is  _ damn  _ good pie,” she added, picking her fork up again.

 

“Thank you,” Brienne said, standing up and hurrying off to the bathroom to fix her eye makeup so nobody would know she’d been crying. She didn’t think she could explain what had just happened to anybody out there--she could find Looker and explain it to him,  _ maybe _ , but she wasn't sure that she wanted to. 

 

It felt personal, private. Something just between her and…  _ her _ .

**Author's Note:**

> Happy birthday, Isis_The_Sphinx, AKA Bri-the-author! This is a weird mixup of your canon and mine sssshhh that’s not important what’s important is that everybody who loves Bri in every universe gets to hug her on her birthday. And she gets the blessed opportunity of her own future self turning up to assure her that when it came to the biggest decision of her life, she made the right choice. I felt like throwing some feels at you for your birthday, after all the ones you gave me with the EOTB chapter. YOU BROUGHT THIS ON YOURSELF <3


End file.
